


light as a bubble, sweet as a kiss

by Yersina



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Established Relationship, First Kiss, Healthy Communication, Kissing, M/M, lots and lots of communication, so many kisses!, will make that a tag through sheer force of will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:20:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26450290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yersina/pseuds/Yersina
Summary: Hyunjin rolls his eyes. It’s not like it’s his fault that he and Seungmin have never kissed. There have always just been better things to do—why kiss when they could be eating food, or watching a TV show together, or doing homework? The most they’ve ever done was when Seungmin pressed a sweet kiss to Hyunjin’s cheek after their first date and Hyunjin was so shocked that he squeaked and fled back into his apartment.
Relationships: Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know, Hwang Hyunjin/Kim Seungmin
Comments: 34
Kudos: 211





	light as a bubble, sweet as a kiss

**Author's Note:**

> if this looks familiar, it's a rewrite of one of my previous fics. i thought about pasting it over, but even though the basic idea is the same, the characters and the content are different enough that i felt the story warranted its own fic. :)

Hyunjin stares at the ceiling, mind whirling with thoughts. There's a small brown stain where Jisung had squished a spider and neither of them were brave enough to clean off its guts.

It’s normal—right? It’s not weird. It’s _not._

“Definitely not normal,” Jisung calls from his side of the room.

“Shut the fuck up,” Hyunjin says automatically. Sometimes he questions why he decided to keep rooming with Jisung—why they _got an apartment together—_ if he can’t stand Jisung’s presence half of the time. “Like _you’re_ the expert, with your singular boyfriend.”

Jisung flushes before hurling his pillow across the room at Hyunjin. Hyunjin catches it and tucks it with the other pillow that he’s cuddling. “At least I’ve kissed him.”

Hyunjin rolls his eyes, but the jab still wedges into his heart like a splinter in the pad of his finger. It’s not like it’s his fault that he and Seungmin have never kissed. There have always just been better things to do—why kiss when they could be eating food, or watching a TV show together, or doing homework? The most they’ve ever done was when Seungmin pressed a sweet kiss to Hyunjin’s cheek after their first date and Hyunjin was so shocked that he squeaked and fled back into his apartment. “Yeah, well at least I’ve never been so preoccupied with having someone’s tongue in my mouth that I set off the fire alarm because I forgot to take the pan off the stove.”

“You—we agreed to never talk about that!” Jisung shrieks, scrambling out of bed and staggering across the five feet of space separating their beds so he can do his best to choke Hyunjin to death. Through the flying pillows and blankets, Hyunjin gleefully notes that Jisung’s face is beet red. “Minho wouldn’t let that go for _weeks!”_

“'Cause it's the funniest shit I’ve ever seen,” Hyunjin wheezes out, doing his best to keep Jisung from shoving him into the mattress. Of course, it hadn’t been funny at the time because he’d been too worried about coming back home to a sobbing roommate, the roommate’s concerned boyfriend who was doing his best to comfort said roommate, and an apartment reeking of smoke, but hindsight made the whole fiasco much more amusing. “Who’s the one still not allowed in the kitchen?”

Jisung gives his ear one last pull before giving up and collapsing onto his side on the mattress next to Hyunjin, staring up at him with a pout. “Whatever. Minho was always the better cook anyway.”

“Keep telling yourself that.” Hyunjin reaches out and combs a hand through Jisung’s messy hair, huffing a laugh when he looks torn between batting Hyunjin’s hand away and enjoying the petting. “Is it really... not normal?”

Hyunjin’s chest bursts with fondness when Jisung immediately shifts gears and gets more serious, a small frown on his face. “Does it make you uncomfortable?”

“That we haven’t kissed?” _Except for the cheek kiss,_ Hyunjin adds silently, but next to Jisung and Minho’s make out sessions, it feels strikingly chaste.

“Yeah.”

Hyunjin’s immediate reaction is _yes,_ because why else would he be so torn up about it? But that doesn’t seem quite right either. It’s not like Hyunjin has been wanting kisses this whole time and never got them or that Seungmin has been pressuring him to do more than he wants. They just… never got around to kissing, somehow. “I don’t know? It bothers me that we haven’t kissed, but I think it would bother me if we kissed, too.”

“Why can’t you just make up your mind and stick with it, Hwang Hyunjin,” Jisung teases. “Always have to be so difficult.” Hyunjin sticks out his tongue in response and it comes so close to the tip of Jisung’s nose that they simultaneously make noises of disgust and jerk away. “Ew, why are you so gross?”

“You started it!”

“I did not.”

“I’m older so therefore I win.” Hyunjin grins at the utterly unimpressed look that Jisung gives him.

“Fine, be that way,” Jisung sulks, turning the corner of his lips down exaggeratedly until he gives up the facade with a sigh and tucks his face into Hyunjin’s chest so he can press his forehead to Hyunjin’s breastbone. Hyunjin automatically curls a hand around Jisung’s waist and settles happily into the half-hug, half-cuddle they end up in. “I’m really bad at giving relationship advice,” he starts, thumping Hyunjin once on the chest with a fist when he snorts. “Don’t laugh at me. I’m bad at giving relationship advice, so I’m channeling Channie-hyung when I say, ‘Do what feels comfortable to you.’ It’s your relationship, man. Fuck what other people say. Even me.”

“Especially you,” Hyunjin murmurs to the crown of Jisung’s head and laughs again when Jisung knocks his forehead against Hyunjin’s chest in retaliation. “Thanks though.” It’s all a mess inside his head—not kissing has always felt the most comfortable, but now that the idea has wormed into his brain, all of their interactions feel just the slightest bit off-kilter and now nothing is comfortable. 

“I’m here for you, man.” There’s a brief pause where Hyunjin starts to wander off in his thoughts, wondering about the last time he saw Seungmin and whether or not he seemed disappointed in their interaction, but then he’s pulled back by the sound of Jisung’s snort.

“What?”

“I’m here for you, man,” he repeats. “But like, no homo.” 

Hyunjin cracks up. It’s not even that funny and Jisung’s sense of humor can be so _stupid_ sometimes, but it feels good after the conversation they just had. “Sorry dude, it’s full homo.”

 _“Bro.”_ Jisung sounds so betrayed that Hyunjin nearly has tears in the corners of his eyes. “Bro, I trusted you.”

Hyunjin shifts back in the bed, enough to stoop down slightly to smack a wet kiss onto Jisung’s forehead, and cackles when Jisung wails loudly and sprints to the bathroom to wash it off. “But like, no homo, dude!” he calls after Jisung’s retreating back. He listens to the water turn on and off before Jisung stampedes back down the hall, sticking his head into the door frame and flipping Hyunjin off.

“I hate you,” he says, face still dripping with water. “You’re an awful roommate and an even worse friend.”

“Love you too,” Hyunjin coos. He blows a kiss at Jisung’s scowl and laughs when he scrunches up his face in disgust. 

“That’s it, I’m kicking you off the lease—I’m gonna call Minho over and he’ll be my new roommate and we’ll even help you move out—” Both of them dive for Jisung’s phone at the same time, making a mess of Jisung’s already chaotic bed.

“Don’t be ridiculous, you two will drive each other crazy within a week—”

“At least it’s better than you making me go insane every hour—”

Hyunjin, by virtue of being taller and more fit because he actually exercises and doesn’t sit at home like a potato until his boyfriend forcibly drags him to the gym to work out, naturally manages to wrestle Jisung into submission by sheer force. It’s not until Hyunjin is lying at the top of a pile of pillows and blankets with Jisung at the very bottom that he realizes Jisung’s master plan. “I’m an idiot,” he marvels out loud.

“Yeah, you are,” Jisung says smugly, snuggling into his incredibly comfortable pile of softness. “You’d think that it’d stop working after the first two times, and yet here we are.”

Hyunjin almost wants to admire his ingenuity. “You asshole.”

Jisung preens. “Thank you.” 

Of course, it backfires on him a few minutes later when it gets to be much too warm under all those layers, with the beginning of summer approaching. Hyunjin takes great pleasure in holding him hostage until Minho knocks on the door wondering why he can hear Jisung screeching even in the hallway. 

* * *

Hyunjin wishes he could say that he forgot about the whole conversation with Jisung, but it festers in his mind for the next few days as he replays it over and over, wondering whether he should bring it up to Seungmin or not. A few days into their official relationship, Seungmin had made it very clear that he valued clear communication in relationships, no matter how awkward it might seem, but it’s a dam of comfort against the tidal wave of Hyunjin’s nervousness. He doubts Seungmin would find him silly or belittle his worries, but the idea of having to give voice to the tangle of thoughts living in the dark corners of his mind isn’t exactly his idea of an enjoyable time.

“Okay, tell me what’s wrong,” Seungmin says, putting down his chopsticks. Hyunjin blinks at him over his own bowl of ramyeon, wondering what prompted this. “Was it something that I did?”

Hyunjin hesitantly sets down his own chopsticks, feeling very lost. All they did was study together and then eat dinner in Hyunjin’s apartment. “I… don’t think so?” he offers slowly. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

Seungmin laces his fingers together like he’s about to give a formal presentation, and it’s so _him_ that Hyunjin wants to laugh. Most people would run a hand through their hair or sigh or fidget—but not Seungmin. “I don’t think it’s something that I can put my finger on, but you’ve been kind of distant for the past few days while we’re texting. You’ve told me that your schoolwork is manageable, though, and so are your dance practices. I was the one who suggested coming over today even though you’re usually the one who invites me over. I don’t want to seem like I’m jumping to conclusions or being overbearing, but I’m a bit worried.” It’s all said in a level, calm tone, but he hesitates near the end and bites his lip. “You’re okay, right? It’s not—is it me?”

“No—no! It’s not you,” Hyunjin hurries to reassure. He casts his mind out for what Seungmin could possibly be picking up on, but he can’t think of anything, until— “Oh. _Oh._ Uh, no, it’s not you—I mean, it’s _kind of_ you? It’s not _really_ you, it’s mostly me, I’m just—”

Hyunjin trips over his words trying to explain himself until Seungmin reaches across the table and awkwardly pats him on the arm. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m not going to be mad or anything. Take your time.”

“I know you’re not going to be mad—” Hyunjin gets out before catching Seungmin’s wry look and ducking his head so he can take the time to organize his thoughts. 

There’s really no escaping it this time. This is the perfect opportunity to bring up Hyunjin’s _dilemma,_ and he’s been thinking about it on and off so much the past few days that it’s about as crystalized as it’s ever going to be, but the words still stick in his throat. “Um.” It’s all that he manages before his well of words dries up again.

Seungmin rubs his arm sympathetically before retreating back to his side of the table. “Would it help if I guessed?” He purses his lips when Hyunjin shrugs, but continues. “You said that it’s kind of about me, but mostly about you, so I assume it’s about something involving both of us?” He waits for Hyunjin’s jerky nod before continuing. “Is it about our relationship?” Hyunjin nods. “About… something that I’m doing in the relationship?” Hyunjin shakes his head before reconsidering and nodding his head and then shaking his head again. Seungmin laughs softly at Hyunjin’s visible frustration.

“It’s not _you,_ it’s just—” Hyunjin groans. “I’m pretty sure I’ve seen more of Minho’s—everything than I have of you. And he doesn’t even live with me. Or date me.” Hyunjin will never forget the time he came home from class early and found Minho shirtless on the couch, as much as he wishes he could bleach it from his brain. Minho hadn’t even bothered to lift his head from kissing Jisung when Hyunjin came in. 

Seungmin’s eyebrows shoot up. “Do you want to see more of me?”

“No!” Hyunjin shouts, and backtracks a moment later when he realizes how that might come off. “I mean. Not right now?”

The eyebrows don’t come down. “That was convincing.”

Hyunjin whines and slumps over onto the table. “I don’t know. I don’t know! It seems stupid.”

“Hey.” Seungmin reaches out and pokes the cheek that isn’t currently plastered to Hyunjin’s arm. Hyunjin scrunches up his nose in the way that he knows Seungmin finds cute, just to watch Seungmin’s eyes crinkle with a reflexive smile. “It’s not stupid if it’s giving you this much stress. Talk to me?”

Hyunjin glares at their mismatched bowls to offset the guilt swirling deep in his gut. “But we’re still eating dinner.”

“We can always eat dinner together another time.” Seungmin hesitates. “Unless you want to keep eating dinner?”

Hyunjin sighs. Even if they did finish eating together, the mood is ruined, and he’d probably find the whole thing unbearably awkward anyway, having to eat in silence while his mind chews away at his worries. Maybe they can leave it for later. “No, not really.” 

“Do you want to talk on the couch?”

Hyunjin knows that Seungmin’s doing his best to be accommodating and considerate, and he’d appreciate it and be grateful for it any other day, but right now, every question is reminding him of the fact that he barely knows his own feelings, and it grates on his nerves. “I don’t care.”

Seungmin pauses. Hyunjin tries not to read into the silence. “Okay, let’s go talk on the couch then.”

They leave their half-empty bowls on the tiny kitchen table and shuffle over to the overstuffed couch that Jisung had scrounged up from somewhere that somehow both clashes and matches with all of their other furniture. Seungmin makes himself comfortable on one end of the couch and waits patiently as Hyunjin settles into the other half. 

Seungmin bites his lip again and stares at their coffee table, which is when Hyunjin has the belated realization that Seungmin isn’t any calmer about all of this than Hyunjin is. He might be better at controlling his outward reactions, but Seungmin is probably just as nervous as he is, especially since Hyunjin has had weeks to mull this over and Seungmin had this sprung on him barely five minutes ago. “Is there a starting point that you want to begin with?”

There isn’t. “I…” Hyunjin fiddles with a loose end in his shirt until the words coalesce in his mind. “Why don’t you kiss me?” Probably not the best way he could have phrased it, but at least it gets them closer to the issue.

Seungmin looks startled and shifts around on the couch cushion until he’s seated cross-legged and facing Hyunjin. “Well, the first time we went out—” already, Hyunjin feels the anticipatory dread build up— “when I kissed you on the cheek, you basically ran away. I wasn’t quite sure how to take that, but I figured that I crossed a boundary and that if you wanted a kiss, you could initiate it the next time instead.” He reaches out and touches the tips of his fingers to Hyunjin’s knee. They don’t actually touch that much, Hyunjin muses. He wonders how much of it is because of that first impression. “If I was wrong, I’m sorry.”

Hyunjin takes Seungmin’s hand and laces their fingers together, mirroring Seungmin’s soft smile. “No, that was probably my fault.”

Seungmin shrugs. “Doesn’t matter whose fault it was, at this point. How can we make it better?” Hyunjin likes the way that he said ‘we’ instead of ‘I’ or ‘you’. It makes him feel more like it’s a problem to be solved by the two of them together, rather than putting the responsibility on one person to make it better.

He holds Seungmin’s hand tighter for a single moment, feeling the secret building up in his chest before he pops it with a swift jab. “I’ve never kissed anyone. Ever.” To his credit, Seungmin only blinks a few times, processing, and waits for Hyunjin to finish. “I’ve never wanted to kiss anyone and I’ve never had anyone to kiss so it just… never happened. But I feel like I _should_ now, even though I know we should move at our own pace.” Hyunjin still feels like he has more to say, but he’s run out of words again.

Seungmin hums. He starts rubbing soothing circles with his thumb where it’s still holding onto Hyunjin’s hand, gentle and soft and sweet as always. “It sounds like you’ve thought this over a lot.”

“I have.”

Seungmin hums again and Hyunjin patiently waits for him to collect his thoughts. “So you feel like you’re being pressured to move faster than you want to—by other people and other relationships, not necessarily me,” he clarifies when he sees Hyunjin’s look.

That feels closer to what’s right, but it’s not a perfect reflection of his thoughts. “I don’t know if that’s something I ever want to do,” he says slowly, testing out the words in his mouth. They don’t feel _right,_ because he does want to try kissing someone at some point, but it’s out of pure curiosity, and not because he _wants_ to kiss. The truth, but not the whole truth. “I—I’m sorry,” he says abruptly, because Seungmin is half of this relationship too, and this is Hyunjin’s struggle, not his. “If you want to break up—”

“Nope,” Seungmin says succinctly. The smile that he gives Hyunjin is one that he wants to press and frame and keep with him forever. “I’m quite happy with you. Kisses or no kisses.”

“Oh, that’s. That’s good.” Hyunjin tries to keep a serious face, but he can feel the grin creeping onto his cheeks and eventually he gives up and beams at Seungmin. “That’s really good.”

Seungmin smiles widely back and they sit for a moment just smiling at each other. Hyunjin feels absurd but also like he’s a bubble, buoyed entirely by the warm breeze of his happiness. “Is it alright if I kiss you on the cheek?” 

“Yes!” Hyunjin declares and gets one pressed to his cheek not a second later. It’s warm and makes a spark of something fizzle in his stomach, and he’s so excited that he turns his head and brushes his lips against Seungmin’s.

It’s not quite the right angle, Hyunjin recognizes immediately, because his nose bumps against Seungmin’s and—he giggles, because _noses._ The entire kiss lasts just the amount of time it takes for Hyunjin to touch his lips briefly to Seungmin’s and pull back, but it’s enough for Hyunjin to recognize that the happy fizzing in his stomach has flattened into something approaching nervousness. 

It dawns on Hyunjin then, like coming up for a breath of water after being submerged or like watching the sun suddenly appear over the horizon, that kisses just aren’t worth it. They aren’t worth stressing over, they aren’t worth forcing himself to do something that he doesn’t want to do, and they’re not worth the sour tinge to the excitement that has been keeping him afloat. The brief brush of lips was pleasant, but so was Seungmin’s kiss on his cheek, and he doesn’t suddenly crave more now that he has officially had his first kiss, doesn’t suddenly understand why Jisung and Minho can spend _hours_ tangled up in Jisung’s bed. That kiss hadn’t changed his life and he doesn’t need to keep worrying over it. The knowledge is… freeing, almost. 

“I don’t like kisses,” he whispers dazedly and hurries to clarify when he sees Seungmin’s confusion. “Mouth kisses. Cheek kisses are fine!” He kisses one of Seungmin’s cheeks to make a point, and then another one to his forehead just for fun. “Mouth kisses are kind of boring.” 

“Boring?” Seungmin echoes with a raised eyebrow. With the giddiness still flowing through Hyunjin’s body, he kind of wants to poke it.

He cups Seungmin’s cheeks instead, detangling their fingers so he can clasp Seungmin’s face between his hands. “I really like you,” he says softly. Maybe it’s the lingering happiness in his stomach, maybe it’s the euphoria of a mystery solved, but nothing has felt truer to him in that moment. “I really, really like you.”

Seungmin’s eyes curve into thin crescents and _god,_ Hyunjin loves his smile and the way it makes him feel like Seungmin is the sun with how much it shines. “Well that’s good, because I really, really like you too.” He reaches up and pulls Hyunjin’s hands away from his face, moving them to the space between their legs, so he can lean forward and peck the tip of Hyunjin’s nose, his mellow laugh ringing in the room when a blush blooms across Hyunjin’s cheeks.

“That’s… that’s good,” Hyunjin says weakly.

“It is,” Seungmin agrees, amusement clear in his voice. “Does this mean that I can give you cheek kisses and forehead kisses and nose kisses whenever I want?” He punctuates each type of kiss with a demonstration and Hyunjin feels like he’s about to combust from the amount of blood that must be in his cheeks.

“Yep,” Hyunjin squeaks out. He hesitates, because the other kind of kiss wasn’t that bad either, just not _special_ in the way that he always thought it was supposed to be. “You can kiss me on the lips too?” It ends up coming out like a question. 

Seungmin tilts his head to the side, considering, and Hyunjin tries not to fidget beneath his gaze. “How about I ask you beforehand and you can tell me if you want it or not?”

It still feels unfair to Seungmin because this is _Hyunjin’s_ problem and Seungmin should get to have the kind of kisses that he wants to have without having to cater to Hyunjin, but he forcibly tells himself that Seungmin wouldn’t have offered if he wasn’t okay with it. “Yeah, okay,” he says, and lets go of the tension in his shoulders that he didn’t even realize was there. “Yes,” he tries again, because the first attempt sounded less than enthusiastic. “I’d like that.”

There’s some sort of gentle amusement on Seungmin’s face, but less like Hyunjin is the butt of a joke he doesn’t understand and more like he’s endeared by Hyunjin’s actions. “You can always change your mind later,” he offers. 

“I know,” Hyunjin says, and tries to kiss Seungmin on the lips again. This time, Seungmin sees it coming and adjusts their angle so that their lips fit together better, but the second kiss is enough to confirm Hyunjin’s opinion that kissing people on the lips is really quite underwhelming. “Thank you.”

“Thank you… for kissing you?” Seungmin asks, though his smirk is enough to tell Hyunjin that he already knows the answer to the question.

Hyunjin huffs with feigned annoyance and shifts backwards. “For being a wonderful boyfriend,” he corrects, squeezing Seungmin’s hands for emphasis. “It means a lot.”

Seungmin softens and lets go of one of Hyunjin’s hands to tuck a lock of hair behind Hyunjin’s ear. If Hyunjin felt like he was going to combust before, now he feels like he might as well be a bundle of fireworks ready to go off at any moment. “You shouldn’t have to thank me for respecting your boundaries,” he says firmly. “But I’m glad that this conversation helped.”

Hyunjin doesn’t know how to reply to that, so he flounders in the awkward silence for a few seconds before adjusting his legs. “So… back to dinner now?”

Seungmin laughs and leans forward to press his lips to Hyunjin’s cheek before climbing off of the couch and pulling Hyunjin with him. “Yeah, let’s go see if our noodles are still warm, shall we?”

(They’re not, they find out, but it’s a simple enough task to reheat them in the microwave, hands tangled together the entire time.)

**Author's Note:**

> i’m pretty sure i gave _myself_ cavities while writing this.
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/yersin_a) | [tumblr](https://littlenookofnonsense.tumblr.com/) | [cc](https://curiouscat.me/yersin_a)


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